AfriGeneas Free Persons of Color Forum

I have never quite understood the Virginia laws because I have long known that freed blacks were supposed to leave the State within a certain time period, but it didn't seem to have been upheld much, as far as I can see. The genealogist was taking a guess about why the free person of color owned 2 slaves, and it is an interesting theory, which I suppose could have been true. But without more research into the SCOTT family that he may have come from, I don't see how that could be a definite conclusion. I know the laws were different but my GREEN ancestors (Creasy, her son Thomas, his wife Priscilla & at least 5 children, plus several unnamed children & grandchildren born since 1791 the year their owner requested their freedom in his will) were freed in 1798 in Warren Co., NC by the General Assembly; in 1800 Thomas Green had a household of 13 free, and 2 slaves, and in 1830, by which time all of his older children had moved out & married, he had 1 male slave. I suspect the slave was to do the farm work because Thomas & Priscilla were elderly by that time.
I am aware that some FCP owned slaves, some were possibly even their relatives, but I don't believe that was always the case, and it would have been nice if more were done on WDYTYA about slavery research. I have nothing against researching one's white ancestors, I have plenty of my own and I enjoy finding out info about my gr-grandparents families, which seem to go back forever. But by not researching more African Americans with slave ancestors, it does a disservice to every one of us who wants to see what it is like to find those kinds of records. It is also one of the reasons I rarely watch that show, it makes things look far too easy and by researching only one race seems to eliminate a great portion of the U.S.
One of the upcoming celebrities they will be researching is Rashida Jones. I'm kind of interested about which side of her family they'll research more, her father, Quincy Jones, or her mother, Peggy Lipton.